Learning to fly or pursue a career in the aviation industry can be expensive. Each month, AOPA highlights scholarship and grant opportunities that students, pilots, and those entering or in aviation-related fields may be interested in applying for. Recent scholarship winners are included as well.

Scholarship opportunities

JetBlue Airways has announced the launch of the JetBlue Foundation, an initiative to encourage and advance aviation-related education. The goal of the foundation is to support efforts to place aviation top-of-mind as a career choice for students by igniting interest in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) programs. It plans to provide three $25,000 grants to schools and educational alliances focusing on STEM and aviation-related programs geared toward underserved groups and communities.

Washington state-based Cascade Warbirds has kicked off two scholarship programs for 2014. The first scholarship, valued at $1,125, is to help youths aged 16 to 21 with tuition, books, and supplies, and two introductory instructional flights. The second scholarship, valued at $1,500, will cover the tuition for the Experimental Aircraft Association’s Advanced Air Academy Aug. 1 through 9 in Oshkosh, Wis.

Scholarship, grant winners

Brandon White, 17, of Urbana, Ohio, has been awarded the second annual Mitchell Cary-Don Gum Memorial Aviation Scholarship, created by the National Aviation Heritage Alliance. The scholarship pays for up to $1,500 of instruction toward a light sport or private pilot certificate. Currently a senior at Urbana High School, White is also enrolled in the Ohio Hi-Point Career Center’s Aviation Occupations Satellite located at Grimes Field-Urbana Municipal Airport. He has completed a private pilot ground school and is taking private pilot lessons at Mad River Air on Grimes Field.

Victoria Williams, a high school senior at Kentucky’s Institute for Aerospace Education, has won the 2013 Fly Now scholarship from the Ninety-Nines' Amelia Earhart Memorial Scholarship Fund, reports General Aviation News. She will attend Eastern Kentucky University’s professional flight program this fall.

The Wichita Aero Club has received a $10,000 grant to its scholarship fund from BBA Aviation’s Charitable Giving Program. The money will be added to the club’s scholarship fund established with the Wichita Community Foundation in 2012. It will help underwrite the club’s existing Edward W. Stimpson Scholarship, and additional educational grants which will be added as the fund grows.

Scholarship roundup

Here’s a reminder of the upcoming deadlines for previously reported scholarships.